


Against the Berserker (There Is No Defence)

by Arkie



Series: DJ, Turn Up The F*king Sound [UMY Garbage Court] [5]
Category: Hat Films - Fandom, The Yogscast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Corpses, Urban Magic Yogs, o no, ploooot, umy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-17 19:51:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18971899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arkie/pseuds/Arkie
Summary: "Come on, Timmy, you old bastard," Sips called on a sigh to the seemingly empty room at large, turning to scan it. Then his eyes locked on something out of Ross's view and he paused, in a surprised sort of way.-A plot's in motion, has been for a while, and there might not be much they can do about it. If puppets knew they were puppets, why would they keep dancing?





	Against the Berserker (There Is No Defence)

**Author's Note:**

> Title from No Defence by NOONE

Shortly after his conversation with Smith, and with Sips and Trott still gone, Ross decided he didn't respect nor owe any particular loyalty to Sips. So, rebellious exploratory urge returned with full force, he cracked opened the door to Sips's guest bedroom and stepped inside once again. 

It looked much as it had before, if a bit more lived in. Bed covers ruffled and unmade, clothes slung haphazardly on the dresser and floor. He padded in, examining the room, steps automatically silent and evenly placed, carefully avoiding disturbing anything even the slightest bit on the floor. His eye caught on the dresser, where sat the small photo frame he'd seen Sips place a few days ago. When nothing else proved more intriguing, he came to pause in front of the photo. Inside were pictured a drily smiling woman, a disgruntled-looking child, and a grinning toddler perched on wobbly legs. 

Sips's family, Ross assumed. The revelation was odd. They looked so normal. Part of a normal human family, like those Ross had seen a hundred times in parks and homes. He wondered if they knew about all this. About magic, about the fae, about Sips's personal court in the city. Would they approve? Would they care, if they knew? Surely they would, but which direction would they fall? Would they be horrified at Sips, for making servants out of such creatures? Or would they be proud, of his managing to do that that so many have tried and failed at? 

Ross couldn't know. It frustrated him, but at the same time he was used to living with very little in the way of given information. Generally, a master would give him no more than was necessary for him to do his job, whatever it might be. He wouldn't be told reasons, or backgrounds. But for some reason, they never seemed to realise that even when he was silent and still, he was listening. And sometimes, when curious enough, he'd go looking for answers himself. 

Maybe that was why his previous master had cut him free. Ross frowned, but didn't want to linger on the unsettling thought. 

Instead, he caught sight of something else. A small, engraved wooden ball the size of a golf ball, on the other side of the dresser.

Ross couldn't resist reaching out and picking it up, gently tracing the curious markings with his thumb. They were indeed runes, as he'd first thought. Some the same, some different. But he knew near nothing about runic magic, certainly not enough to have a hope of recognising them. It certainly was a strange thing, though. It was what had brought Sips all the way here, away from his family and regular life, to barge into theirs. Even if nothing else so far, it had done that. Maybe that in itself was some sort of power. 

Ross set it back down softly, exactly as it had been. 

* * *

Very late that night, a while after the pair had returned, Ross found Trott alone in the dim hall, half collapsed against the wall and shoulders and breathing shuddering, face hidden behind a hand. He was crying. 

Ross moved towards him gently and stopped when he suddenly looked up, realising he was there. Recognising Ross, he sort of paused, watching; still wary and tense, but not running away or trying to hide his tears. 

The urge bubbled up in Ross's heart, but he first awkwardly looked away, to the wall, then the floor. Then, drawing a blank for anything better to do, he awkwardly raised his arms, extended halfway in front of him. 

Trott hiccoughed something halfway between a laugh and a sob. But his shoulders slumped, relaxing, so Ross was glad. He ducked into Ross's arms and Ross wound carefully around him. He wasn't sure how comfortable he was to hug, being made of stone and all, but he tried his very best nonetheless. 

He relaxed and tucked his nose in Trott's hair and prepared to stay there for as long as he was needed. 

A little later, when all had gone quiet, there came a very quiet mumble from somewhere towards his chest. 

"You're so _good_ , Ross," he murmured. "What the hell are you doing here with us?" 

Ross frowned at the question and tightened his grip minutely. "I _want_ to be here." 

It had seemed like Trott was going to say something else, but he only softly sighed and buried himself deeper. 

* * *

When Ross came in for breakfast, Sips was deep in what sounded like an argument on the phone. 

"What-- No," Sips seemed to interject, brows downturned into an annoyed frown. "What are you talking about? That was nothing, it didn't even..." A pause, then he sighed heavily. "C'mon, Sjin, the guy calls himself ' _The Master_ ', who the hell does that? A pathetic fucking tryhard, that's who. You can't tell me you've actually heard of him?" A long pause. Sips ran his hand through his hair, lip curling in annoyance, clearly running out of patience.

"I _know_ ," he grunted. "I _know_ , Sjin, _god_. Just butt out, ok? It'll be fucking fine. Nothing'll happen, it'll all just be a big fucking anticlimax. You're probably just-- running away with your crazy ideas as usual. No-- It-- That doesn't fucking mean anything!" he exploded. "Listen, I'll tell you what - I'll call you in a week, when I'm back with my family and everything's been resolved. It'll all blow over, just you wait. Bye, Sjin."

He wrenched the phone from his ear and stabbed what Ross assumed was the 'end call' button, and slammed the phone down on the counter. Slumping over his elbows, Sips shoved his face into his hands, breathing hard from irritation. 

Ross took that as his cue to sidle over to the actual breakfast food instead of just standing there listening like a creeper. The other two were sat at the bar, eyes down and eating in silence, though probably listening just as intently as him.

But then Sips emerged from his hands, to shove a finger vaguely in Ross's direction, and then Smith's, hair ruffled and teeth grinding. 

"You two." He sounded sort of exhausted. "You'll come with me today."

Ross started and stared. Then he shared a glance with Smith, who pursed his lips and gave him something like a vague shrug, and returned to his meal. 

Mechanically, Ross returned to the motions of gathering together his breakfast.

Sips was worried, for the first time Ross had seen. He wondered what the person on the other end of line had told him. 

* * *

They ended up in a high-rise building of offices towards the middle of the city. White walls, plastic-wood furniture, the whole city stretched out before their feet from the long windows. 

Sips lead them through as though he knew the place like the back of his hand. Maybe he did, Ross didn't know. 

"How do you know this guy, anyway?" Smith mumbled to Sips. 

The few eyes they passed paused on them only the minutest moment, if at all. Ross wasn't sure if it was down to some sort of glamour, or if their presence was simply nothing of note. 

"What, me and Timmy? Oh, we go way back." Sips waved an airy hand. "I helped a mutual friend out of a sticky situation, put us in touch. He's helpful guy, really. Has eyes and ears in useful places. A little timid, maybe, a little easy to push around." He gave a smile that showed just slightly too many teeth. "But I find that's not too terrible a thing for a person to be."

Ross's eyes kept catching on the sights down below - tiny people in suits bustling about, fingers darting over touchscreen phones, a lucky few grabbing a few moments' break, sunning themselves on a glistening fountain's edge, eyes closed and head tipped back. He hadn't realised he'd lagged behind, watching, fascinated and enamoured, until Smith surreptitiously reached out and grabbed him, yanking him along a step. Ross stumbled but recovered and hurried after them. 

They reached a reception desk in the nook of a corridor and Sips directed a half-smile and a nod to the woman sat behind it. "Julie."

Julie lifted her heavily-lidded gaze from her computer, head leant on a hand. She didn't seem to find their appearance very interesting, as her glance lasted barely a moment before she returned to her screen and ignored them. Unfazed, Sips strode past, pushing open the door by the desk and breezing inside. 

Past him, Ross saw the desk inside the office was vacant, arranged with piles of papers and a cushioned black desk chair.

"Come on, Timmy, you old bastard," Sips called on a sigh to the seemingly empty room at large, turning to scan it. Then his eyes locked on something out of Ross's view and he paused, in a surprised sort of way. Smith turned to follow his gaze and half-recoiled in shock, eyes going wide and jerking back an involuntary step. 

Following, Ross stepped properly into the room and looked between them to see what had them both frozen. 

At first he thought it was some sort of life-sized dummy, inexplicably strung up on a wall. But then he saw the milky eyes, the slack mouth, the blood in the slicked-back politician's-haircut. It was a man, wearing what had once been a clean business suit, crushed back against the wall by cords, which on second glance proved to be actual electric cables, burst free from the wall behind to snake around his arms and legs and chest and head, each string crumpling the body inward towards the wall in a sickly unnatural way, bones long crushed inside the meat suit. His Oxfords hung limp off the floor by several feet. 

The corpse hung suspended in the silence, an unmoving pendulum. Sips moved up to it, mouth twisted slightly in what might have been pity, or might have been disgust. He put his hands on his hips and sighed, looking up into the face of the dead man he'd once knew. "Oh, Timmy." He didn't sound all that upset, though. More disappointed. "Really stepped in it this time, haven't you?" 

"What could have done this?" Smith breathed, frowning. 

"I don't know, Smiffy, you're the damn magic horse, why don't you tell me?" Sips snarked back without looking back. 

Smith fell silent. 

Very quietly, Ross spoke up. "He knew something, didn't he? Something someone didn't want him to tell us?" 

Sips sighed heavily. "...Yeah, probably."

Then Smith spoke suddenly. "Hey. Look." He stepped closer, head tilted, brows furrowed in scrutiny. "Are those letters? In the cords?" 

Ross looked closer, as Sips took a step back to survey the body. He was right, Ross realised. The cables along either arm were busy and etched in particular directions, letters large and capital. He made out a 'Y', a 'O', an 'U', an 'R', an 'F'... or was it an 'E'? 'I'... No, 'T'...

"'You're... too... late _'_?" Smith sounded out slowly. Then frowned. "What, to save this guy?"

"Maybe," Sips mused. "To find out whatever we would have. Bit dramatic, though, just for ol' Timmy." 

A moment of contemplation later, something odd happened.

Smith inhaled sharply and flinched, and they both glanced back at him. Then, tense, he frowned. "Something just happened," he muttered. He raised a hand, lightly touched his chest. "I just felt something."

But then something in his mind seemed to click, and his fingers curled into daggers, digging through his shirt, as though reaching for his heart.

" _Trott_ ," he gasped. 

* * *

At some point early in the previous night, when all was still quiet and lonely, Ross found himself in a part of the apartment he hadn't ventured to in some time. He couldn't remember what he was doing there, or anything of the past few minutes. 

He frowned and headed back towards his room, trying to shake off the strangeness. But, unbidden, a sense of _something_ filtered in through the back of his mind. 

It felt like _success_. 

* * *

When they arrived back at the apartment, following a rush of sprinting and broken speed limits, the front door was closed, but clicked open at their touch, unlocked. 

Smith burst through first. "Trott!" he shouted, skittering down the hall. He spun once on the spot, not stopping, eyes and mind darting about faster than Ross could keep up with. Then he growled and bolted off down around the corner, farther into the apartment. 

Agitated, Ross mimicked him, checking rooms, but not entirely hopeful to find anything. If that message meant anything...

Sips let them both go, lingering by the door. Though he too looked oddly tense and serious. 

All had gone silent when Ross made it to the dingy last spare-room-slash-storage-room, and found Smith knelt before an open trunk. The trunk's contents had been tossed aside, and Ross could see down to the flat, empty bottom. 

Smith was completely still, palms flat on the floor on either side of him, head down and eyes blank. 

Ross felt Sips come to stand by his shoulder. 

"Trott's gone," Smith breathed. "And so is his skin."

**Author's Note:**

> Some people might have figured it all out by now, but most probably not. Fear not, all will be explained. ;) 
> 
> Would you believe that the image of a guy crushed against a wall by cords literally came to me in a dream back while writing one of the earliest parts? I woke up and was like, well, shit, I'm gunna have to go fucking write that now, aren't I? Damn subconscious, being more creative than I ever could be. 
> 
> Only about two more parts left after this! But don't worry - I love this series so much, I probably won't be able to resist coming back to write a few prequels or epilogues.


End file.
